Next-generation networks or Voice over IP (VoIP) have a variety of applications, from allowing telephone calls and facsimiles to be made over IP networks to being used as a framework for a Voice XML system. One next-generation network architecture is based on a gateway architecture utilizing media gateways, media gateway controllers, and signaling gateways. Media gateways have been used to implement media resources, such as Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) resources, needed by applications such as a Voice XML system.
Media resources such as ASR, Text-to-Speech, Conference Bridge, and echo canceller resources are very large and complex and consume significant computing and storage resources. Provisioning a media gateway with an ASR resource requires not only loading the executable code into the gateway, but also grammars, special-purpose vocabularies, and acoustic models. In the past, a decision had to be made to either over-provision the media gateway with the functional packages, thus contributing greatly to the expense of the media gateway, or to risk having the ASR component not be available when needed.